Gifts
by jane0904
Summary: A little standalone while I get the next full-length story together. It's someone's birthday ... and this is for the Tuesday crowd! Please read, enjoy, review.


"Perfume." Esposito filled his cup with coffee, inhaling the scent gratefully.

"Chocolates," Ryan countered.

"She doesn't eat chocolates."

"Of course she does. She's a woman." He moved his partner to one side to get to the jug.

"Well, she doesn't wear perfume, either," Rick pointed out, sitting at the table in the rest room, staring into his own beverage, hoping he could see the future in its murky depths but only thinking of cherries.

"It doesn't matter." Esposito joined him. "Make it expensive enough and she'll like it."

"Expensive," Rick echoed mournfully.

"A huge box of chocolates." Ryan wasn't about to let go of his idea. "Gold ribbon, three layers. Hand-made."

"Any particular flavours?" Esposito asked, amused.

"Not coffee."

"Is that her or you?"

"Come on," Ryan scoffed. "No sane person likes coffee-flavoured things. They never taste real."

"I like them."

"I rest my case."

"Are you impugning my sanity?"

"Not sure. Perhaps you'd better ask the writer."

They both turned to Castle.

Rick looked up. "Definitely. And anyway, I can't buy her chocolates. She'll accuse me of trying to make her fat."

Esposito shrugged. "A couple of extra pounds isn't going to matter."

Ryan stared at his partner. "No wonder you can't keep a girlfriend."

"I mean she can always diet them off."

Shaking his head, this time Ryan whistled. "Wow. So not only are you putting temptation in her way, but telling her she needs to be stick thin as well."

"Says the man who ogled up the models at Fashion Week."

"So did you."

"Guys, this isn't helping." Rick sighed heavily.

"You know you don't have to get her anything," Esposito pointed out. "It's not compulsory."

"Are _you_ going to get her anything?" Rick asked.

"Nope."

"It's her birthday."

"So? In case you haven't noticed, Beckett doesn't exactly do the gift thing."

Rick sighed again, remembering Christmas. Everybody had had a Secret Santa, only Kate refused to play the game.

"It's over-hyped," she'd said. "Christmas should be about family and friends, not expensive presents."

"You're a friend," Rick had insisted. "So it includes you."

"And I'll be thinking about my friends when I work Karpowski's shift so she can go visit her family."

Rick had been shocked. "You're working Christmas?"

"Murders don't stop just for the holidays, Castle. If anything, they just get more inventive."

"Like the guy struck with a frozen turkey," Ryan put in, glancing at his partner. "You remember that?"

Esposito nodded. "Then the wife ate the evidence."

"Ah, fun times."

"You're making that up," Rick accused.

"Nope. Scouts honour." Ryan crossed his heart. "Then there was the old woman who poisoned her neighbour with mistletoe berries because he played his Christmas carol CD too loud."

Esposito grinned. "It sure brings out the crazies."

Rick pointed at him with his coffee cup. "You said that about Hallowe'en."

"Welcome to the life of a homicide detective," Kate had said, getting up to go and interview their latest suspect.

"I still think you were making half of that up," Rick said, back in the present, his cup currently going cold in his hand.

"Not a word. Ask Beckett. And I still say chocolates. Big, big box." Ryan looked around, as if checking nobody was spying on them. Fortunately he noticed that very person making her way purposefully towards them. He coughed, loudly.

"Don't you have any work to do?" Kate asked, her eyes narrowing. She knew the signs – these men had been talking about women, and probably, more specifically, her. And she hated being talked about behind her back. "Because if you don't, I'm sure I can find you something." Her gaze fell on Ryan. "Did you get the results back on the prints we found at Gallagher's?"

"Not yet."

"Then chase them up. I'd like to put that case to bed before the end of the century." Her eyes slid around to Esposito. "Any action on Debrille's credit cards?"

"Not so far."

"Remind them we need to know as soon as possible. He's not going to get away again." She span on her heel and headed for her desk.

"That was close," Ryan breathed, then jumped like a jackrabbit startled by headlights when she glanced back over her shoulder at them.

---

"So?" Rick asked, waiting for his mother's expert opinion.

Martha Rodgers took a sniff from the tiny cut-glass bottle, then looked at her son. "Darling, she'll never wear that," she exclaimed.

"What? Why not?"

"Well, for a start it's five hundred dollars an ounce, if not more, and it's not meant for young, vibrant women. Only dried up old actresses like me." She picked up her wine glass and took a mouthful to clear the scent.

"You're not dried-up."

"I'm not old, either, and neither is Kate. She'd hate you forever if you give her that."

"Can I?" Alexis asked, closing the fridge door and moving closer.

"Here." Martha held the perfume out. "You tell him. He's not listening to me. As usual."

"I do listen," Rick protested. "Sometimes."

"Exactly. Only this should be one of those times, kiddo."

He ignored her, focusing his attention on his daughter. "Well?"

Alexis had taken a delicate breath through her nose, considering her next words carefully. "It's nice."

"See?" Rick said, turning on Martha.

"But it's not Kate."

"What?" He stared at his precocious child. "Why not?"

"She's ... fresher. Delicate. More ... fruity."

Again his thoughts flashed to cherries, but he hadn't been able to find anything even remotely similar, so he'd gone with his credit card instead. "So what do _you_ think Beckett would like?"

"Jewellery," his mother said immediately before Alexis could speak.

"Anything more specific?"

Martha waggled the third finger of her left hand at him. "How about a ring?"

Alexis didn't quite snort, but it was a close thing.

"I don't think so," Rick said, putting a lot of disdain into the words, although if truth be told he wasn't so appalled by the idea as he thought he would be. But no matter his family's matchmaking, that sort of thing was way off in the future. If ever. "Besides, I'm trying to marry _you_ off, not the other way around."

"And if you did get her something expensive, Kate would feel obliged to buy you something costing a lot in exchange for your birthday," Alexis added. "And I don't think she can afford anything extravagant."

Rick was surprised that they thought he was so mercenary. "I don't want anything back."

"You don't?" Martha stared at him. "Men always want something in return. And you're a man. At least, last time I looked."

"That was a long time ago."

"Not that long. You didn't close the bathroom door only a couple of weeks –"

Rick glared. "Considering what I've seen of some of the men you've brought back –"

"Children, children," Alexis admonished. "You carry on like this and I'll send you to bed without any supper."

Rick grinned. His daughter was more of a parent than he'd ever be. "No, you're right. As much fun as this is, it isn't exactly getting me anywhere." The grin faded. "I just wanted to get her something. To show how much ..."

"How much she means to you?" Alexis was also very perceptive.

"Anything wrong with that? I mean, she made Nikki Heat what she is. Without her there wouldn't _be_ any Nikki Heat."

Alexis and Martha exchanged knowing looks, before the older woman said, "Just get her something in a big box. That would do it for me."

"Size doesn't mean anything."

"That's what all men say."

Alexis coughed. "Too much information, Grams."

"Anyway, I don't want a present in return." Rick shifted his buttocks on the stool at the counter. "This would be … I don't know. A token of my esteem. For letting me, even a little bit, into her life. For being the person she is."

"I think my idea was the right one," Martha muttered into her glass.

Alexis thought for a moment, then said slowly, "Maybe you should let her into _your_ life."

"I try!"

"No, I don't mean … you never told her why you became a writer."

He squirmed slightly, remembering the story he'd made up, but then he hadn't been able to keep a straight face, so she'd guessed he was lying. "That's … personal."

"Exactly, Dad. But with her father, her mother being killed … don't you think that's personal too?"

Rick looked at his daughter, as always, surprised by her insight. "You have an old soul."

"I'm still not sure if you're insulting me or not."

"Not."

"Good." She grinned at him. "I'm just saying, it isn't the gift, but the thought behind it."

He nodded slowly. "The thought behind it …" he mused.

---

The case had been solved, put to bed, the bad guy locked up where he couldn't do any further damage. Rick had been halfway home before he realised he'd left his keys in the rest room, and he told the taxi driver to turn around. The late afternoon traffic meant it took a while, and it was dark by the time he walked back into the precinct, but somehow he wasn't surprised to see Kate still working.

Walking into the bull pen, he perched on the edge of her desk and asked, almost accusingly, "What are you doing still here?"

"Paperwork." She indicated the pile of buff folders. "Someone has to do it."

"It's your birthday."

"So?"

"You should be out. Celebrating."

"Maybe I'm going to later."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Are you?"

She looked back at her work. "No."

"Why not?"

"I don't do birthdays."

"They're fun."

She poked him with the butt of her pen. "Only if you're a man. If you're a woman they're just reminders that you're getting older."

Another poke and he got the message, sliding from her desk and dropping into the chair beside it. He glanced towards the few cards she'd received from her colleagues, opened and thanked for, but lying in a pile next to the telephone. "You're not old. And that's so sad. Isn't Lanie taking you out for a drink at least?"

"She's otherwise engaged."

"A man?" He had a brief vision of their esteemed Medical Examiner in that tight satin dress, 'the girls' on display ...

"I hope so." Kate managed a smile. "Anyway, the paperwork still needs to get done."

"Isn't it Ryan's turn?"

"I said I'd do it." She sat back. "He's taking his girlfriend out for a special night."

"Do I hear wedding bells?"

"Not if he's careful."

"Then at the risk of getting my head bitten off, why isn't your father expecting you home?"

Kate didn't sigh, but only because she was holding it under tight control. "No. He's gone to Florida on a golfing holiday, with some of his old army buddies."

"Sounds like fun."

"He doesn't even play golf."

"Then he'll get a tan." He looked closer at her. "You didn't want him to go, did you?"

"I didn't say that."

"No. I can see you. Sitting there. Not saying that."

She glared at him, but he didn't run away or burst into flames, and eventually her gaze softened. "Okay, maybe I didn't. But this is the first year we couldn't at least see each other around my birthday. Not since … not since my mother was killed."

"Ah."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing." He watched her eyes narrow, but when he didn't say anything further she looked back down to her work, making a notation. Carefully, as quietly as possible, he reached into his pocket, withdrawing something that sat snugly in the palm of his hand. As she closed a folder and opened another, he reached over and placed it on the typed page in front of her.

"What …" She looked up.

He wondered for a second if he should mention how much he loved seeing that little dint between her eyebrows when she was confused, but considering she was wearing a gun and he wanted to see Alexis get married one day, he decided not to. "It's a rock." _And not the kind my mother meant, either_, he added silently.

Kate picked up the grey stone. It was slightly smaller than her fist, and rounded smoothly across the top. "I can see that. But –"

"Turn it over."

She did, and saw for the first time a whorl impressed across the surface. She ran her fingers over it, feeling the proudly standing ridges. "Is it carved?"

"No. It's real. It's an ammonite," Rick explained, keeping his voice low. "Several thousand years old."

"Where did you get it?"

"My mother was in a tour of A Chorus Line, and she took me with her. I was ten." His eyes took on a distant gleam, looking back over the years. "One day, when there was no performance, we drove out to one of the forests. The sun was out, she went to sleep, and I explored." He brought himself back to the here and now. "I found that in an old dried-up stream bed. I think it was the first thing I ever owned that I felt was really mine." He had to smile. "Of course, by the time I got back she'd woken up not knowing where I was, and had convinced herself I'd been eaten by a grizzly. She was about to call out the Park Rangers. I think she shouted at me all the way back to the boarding house."

"She was just worried about you."

"I know." He chuckled. "Anyway, it's been my lucky charm for a long time. At least until Alexis was born. And now it's yours."

He could see her thinking, probably visualising the densely packed trees, the warmth making his skin perspire, the cool breeze keeping it comfortable, and he knew the moment she realised he was trying to give her a piece of himself, something beyond the shallow, the surface that he showed everyone, and it made his stomach flutter.

"I can't accept it." She tried to give it back.

"Yes, you can." He wrapped his fingers around hers, closing her hand around the stone. "I want you to have it. To remind you of me."

"Why? Are you going somewhere?"

She suddenly looked uncertain, and the fluttering grew into a fully-fledged stampede because maybe she didn't want him to leave.

"No. Not planning it. But no-one knows what the future's going to bring. And there will come a point where there are no more Nikki Heat books, and I won't have that …" He was going to say 'that excuse to be around you', but changed it suddenly. "That reason for annoying you."

"I could be tempted to throw it at you," she pointed out.

"I'll duck."

"I've got a good aim."

"I know."

They gazed at each other, something between them on a knife edge that could go either way.

"Castle ..." she began, but he interrupted.

"Come on."

"What?"

"You're coming with us."

"Who?"

"If you say 'when' next I'll start to get annoyed." He tempered his words with a grin. "With Alexis, my mother, and me. It's a tradition. We always go out for dinner on birthdays. It's a family thing."

"I'm not your family."

"You're my friend. I think that counts."

She indicated the files, not getting any less. "I have all these reports to complete, and –"

"And nothing. They can wait. Nobody expects them to be letter perfect, not right now. And if you like, I'll help you with them tomorrow. My English is _very_ good."

"I can't."

"Yes, you can."

"I'm still on duty."

"If you really want, you can come back after. But everyone gets a chance to eat."

She shook her head stubbornly. "Besides, you'll never get a table now. And your mother and Alexis might have other plans."

"I've already called them. _And _the restaurant. Antonelli's. A table for four. By the window." He dropped his head so he could look out from under his eyebrows at her. "They have a band."

"A band. Really."

He could see her having to hold her resolve together. "Four courses. And some of those little pastries you like so much."

"The small ones? Just a mouthful?"

He nodded. "A dozen different varieties." He watched her consider the options, and let the smile grow across his face as he saw her give in.

Not that it was quite that easy. "We'll go Dutch."

"At Antonelli's?"

"Then I'll contribute."

"No."

"I insist."

"I refuse." He stood up, holding out her hand. "It's your birthday."

"Hmmn." Still, she let him assist her to her feet. She turned around and picked up her leather jacket, shrugging into it. "Just so long as you know this is against my will."

"So you're going to charge me with kidnap?"

"I'm tempted to."

He smirked. "Sounds like fun."

"Strip searches, cold showers ..."

"Another time then, maybe." He reached over and closed the file. "But for now ... Detective Beckett, would you like to accompany me to dinner?"

"You and your family," she pointed out.

"Right." Not a date. Definitely not that. Just dinner.

"Then it will be my pleasure." She smiled, slowly, warmly.

He returned it as they headed for the elevator, noting without comment that Kate had slid his gift into her pocket, accepting that part of him gracefully. Maybe one day she'd accept something more, but until then this was enough, and as the metal doors opened he couldn't help the smug look, even if it did earn him an elbow in the ribs.


End file.
